Through the Fog

Author: Emery Lane Grey

  • Just Another Day

    They say it’s your day—

    like that means something

    you’re supposed to feel.

    Like candles and wishes

    are enough

    to make it matter.

    But it comes

    like any other morning—

    quiet,

    unremarkable,

    the same weight

    waiting for you

    before your feet

    hit the floor.

    Messages trickle in—

    “happy birthday,”

    short, bright,

    easy to send.

    You read them,

    type back something grateful,

    something light,

    something that doesn’t say

    how it actually feels.

    Because how do you explain

    that another year

    doesn’t feel like a celebration?

    That it feels like time passing

    without asking

    if you’re ready for it.

    Like you’re still

    the same person

    trying to figure things out—

    just older,

    just more aware

    of what didn’t turn out

    the way you thought it would.

    There’s no party

    for that.

    No candles

    for the things you lost,

    the versions of yourself

    that didn’t make it here.

    So the day moves on—

    like it always does.

    And you move with it,

    smiling when you need to,

    thanking people

    for remembering.

    But deep down,

    it doesn’t feel like yours.

    It just feels

    like another day

    you survived.

  • You’re Married to a Nightmare

    You don’t call it that.

    Not out loud.

    You call it stress,

    a rough patch,

    something every couple goes through

    if they just try hard enough.

    Because nightmares

    aren’t supposed to wear a ring,

    aren’t supposed to sit across from you

    at the same table

    and ask how your day was

    like everything is fine.

    But this one does.

    It smiles

    when people are watching.

    Speaks gently

    in rooms that echo.

    Knows exactly

    how to look like love

    from a distance.

    And you—

    you’ve learned the choreography.

    When to stay quiet.

    When to soften.

    When to shrink yourself

    just enough

    to keep the peace

    from breaking open.

    You measure your words

    like they could detonate.

    You swallow reactions

    before they reach your mouth.

    You become careful

    in ways that don’t feel like you anymore.

    And still—

    it’s never quite enough.

    There’s always a shift.

    A tone.

    A silence

    that stretches too long.

    Something small

    that turns into something bigger

    before you can stop it.

    So you adjust again.

    Call it compromise.

    Call it patience.

    Call it love.

    Anything

    but what it feels like

    when the lights go out

    and you’re left alone

    with the version of this

    no one else sees.

    Because how do you explain

    that the person

    you promised forever to

    is the same one

    you brace yourself for?

    How do you leave

    something that still

    looks like a life

    from the outside?

    So you stay.

    Not because it’s easy—

    but because it’s complicated,

    and untangling it

    feels heavier

    than carrying it.

    But deep down,

    beneath all the reasons

    you’ve built to justify it—

    you know.

    Love isn’t supposed

    to feel like survival.

  • Broken Like Me

    I recognize it in you

    before you say a word—

    that quiet heaviness,

    the way you carry yourself

    like you’re holding something

    no one else can see.

    You smile

    at the right moments,

    say the right things,

    move through the world

    like you’ve learned

    how to pass for okay.

    But I see the cracks.

    Not the kind

    that shatter everything—

    the kind that run deep,

    silent,

    just beneath the surface.

    The kind you hide

    because explaining them

    would take too long,

    and most people

    wouldn’t stay long enough

    to understand.

    That’s how I know—

    you’re broken

    like me.

    Not ruined.

    Not beyond repair.

    Just shaped

    by things

    that didn’t ask permission

    before they changed you.

    We don’t talk about it.

    We don’t need to.

    There’s something

    in the way we exist

    around each other—

    a quiet recognition,

    a shared language

    made of what we don’t say.

    And maybe that’s enough.

    Not fixing.

    Not saving.

    Just knowing

    you’re not the only one

    walking around

    with pieces that don’t quite fit

    the way they used to.

    Broken—

    but still here.

    Still feeling.

    Still finding ways

    to hold together

    in a world

    that never promised

    we wouldn’t fall apart.

  • I Wish You Would Leave So I’d Have a Reason to Drink

    I wish you would leave—

    slam the door,

    say something cruel enough

    to make it easy.

    Give me a clean ending,

    something sharp

    I could point to

    and say

    that’s where it broke.

    Because right now

    it’s not broken—

    just bent

    in ways that don’t look like damage

    until you try to stand on it.

    You stay.

    Soft.

    Familiar.

    Close enough

    to call it love

    on the good days.

    Distant enough

    to make me question

    everything

    on the bad ones.

    And I sit here

    in the middle of it—

    not hurt enough to walk away,

    not whole enough to stay

    without feeling it.

    So I wait.

    For something louder.

    For something final.

    For a reason

    that makes sense

    to anyone but me.

    Because if you left,

    if you made it obvious,

    if you turned into something

    I couldn’t defend—

    then maybe

    I wouldn’t have to sit with this.

    Maybe I could pour it out

    into something stronger,

    call it heartbreak,

    call it coping,

    call it anything

    but what it is.

    Which is this—

    loving someone

    who doesn’t quite lose me,

    but doesn’t fully keep me either.

    And the quiet truth

    I don’t say out loud—

    I don’t want you to leave.

    I just want this

    to hurt enough

    to justify

    the way it already does.

  • Learning to Swim

    At first,

    I thought I was drowning.

    Arms wild,

    lungs burning,

    heart panicking

    at the weight of it all.

    I fought the water—

    kicked against it,

    pushed,

    thrashed

    like survival meant

    winning.

    But water doesn’t fight back.

    It just holds you

    or lets you sink.

    No one told me

    how much of this

    was learning to stop

    fighting what I’m in.

    So I slowed.

    Not all at once—

    just enough

    to notice

    that the surface

    was closer

    than I thought.

    That if I leaned back

    instead of forward,

    if I trusted

    even a little—

    I wouldn’t disappear.

    I wouldn’t fall

    through the bottom

    of something

    that doesn’t have one.

    I’d float.

    Awkward at first.

    Unsteady.

    Unsure

    if I could trust it to last.

    But it held me.

    And maybe

    that’s what this is—

    not learning

    how to escape the water,

    but learning

    how to stay in it

    without losing myself.

    Learning

    that survival

    doesn’t always look like struggle.

    Sometimes

    it looks like surrender—

    like letting something

    carry you

    until you remember

    how to move

    without fear.

  • Somewhere Between

    I exist

    somewhere between

    letting go

    and holding on.

    Not fully lost,

    not fully found—

    just suspended

    in a moment

    that won’t decide

    what it wants to be.

    I replay things

    I should’ve released,

    hold onto words

    that already faded,

    search for meaning

    in places

    that stopped answering.

    And still—

    there’s a part of me

    that won’t give up.

    A quiet voice

    that says

    this isn’t the end,

    even when everything

    feels like it already passed.

    Maybe I’m not stuck.

    Maybe I’m becoming—

    slowly,

    uncertainly,

    in ways I don’t recognize yet.

    Maybe this in-between

    isn’t something to escape…

    but something

    I have to move through

    to find

    whatever comes next.

  • Still Here

    Some days

    I move like a question

    no one bothered to answer—

    half-formed,

    half-finished,

    carrying pieces of myself

    that don’t quite fit anymore.

    I’ve tried to outrun it—

    the weight,

    the noise,

    the quiet kind of ache

    that doesn’t scream

    but never really leaves.

    But it follows.

    In the pauses.

    In the way I hesitate

    before saying I’m okay.

    In the way I’ve learned

    to sit with silence

    like it’s something

    I deserve.

    And still—

    I wake up.

    Still—

    I breathe

    even when it feels

    like effort.

    Still—

    some small part of me

    keeps reaching

    for something softer

    than what I’ve known.

    I don’t always believe

    in better.

    But I believe

    in this—

    that I’m still here,

    still standing

    in the middle of it all,

    and maybe

    that means

    something hasn’t given up on me yet.

  • Find My Way Home

    I keep thinking

    home is a place—

    a doorway I’ll recognize,

    a feeling that settles

    the second I step inside.

    But everywhere I go

    feels temporary,

    like I’m passing through

    something that was never

    meant to keep me.

    I’ve chased it in people—

    in the way they said my name,

    in the spaces they made for me,

    in the moments

    I thought I finally belonged.

    But people leave.

    Or change.

    Or become something

    I can’t stay inside of anymore.

    And suddenly

    I’m standing there again—

    hands empty,

    heart full of something

    that doesn’t know where to go.

    So I start over.

    New places.

    New faces.

    New versions of myself

    I hope will finally feel right.

    But the truth is—

    I’ve been looking outward

    for something

    that was never out there.

    Because home

    isn’t a person.

    It isn’t a place

    that can disappear on me.

    It’s something quieter than that.

    Something I have to build

    inside myself—

    piece by piece,

    through every mistake,

    every loss,

    every time I didn’t think

    I’d make it through.

    Maybe finding my way home

    isn’t about arriving.

    Maybe it’s about learning

    to stay

    with myself

    long enough

    to feel like

    I never left.

  • Making Mama Proud

    I think about you

    in the quiet moments—

    not the loud ones

    where everyone’s watching,

    but the in-between

    where it’s just me

    and the weight of who I am.

    I wonder

    if this is what you hoped for.

    If the person I’m becoming

    is someone

    you’d recognize with pride

    or with worry

    you wouldn’t say out loud.

    I carry your voice with me—

    in the way I second-guess,

    in the way I try again,

    in the way I don’t quit

    even when I want to.

    You taught me

    how to stand up straight,

    how to be kind

    even when it’s not returned,

    how to hold onto something good

    in a world

    that doesn’t always give it back.

    But you didn’t teach me

    how to feel like I’m enough.

    So I chase it—

    in work,

    in love,

    in the way I keep pushing

    like there’s a version of me

    just ahead

    that finally gets it right.

    I want to make you proud.

    Not in the ways people measure—

    not in titles or applause—

    but in the quiet knowing

    that I didn’t give up on myself.

    That I kept going

    when it got hard.

    That I stayed

    when it would’ve been easier

    to walk away.

    And maybe

    that’s what you wanted all along—

    not perfection,

    not some polished version of me—

    just someone

    who kept trying

    to be better

    than the person they were

    yesterday.

    I don’t know

    if I’m there yet.

    But I’m still trying.

    And I hope

    that somewhere

    in all of this becoming—

    that counts.

  • Burning Quietly

    Johnny Cash said

    love would burn—

    and I believed him.

    I pictured fire

    the way people talk about it—

    warm, golden,

    something that lights you up

    without taking anything

    you can’t replace.

    I thought it would feel like passion.

    Like heat in the right places.

    Like something alive

    that made everything brighter.

    I didn’t know

    fire also destroys.

    Didn’t know

    it could get inside you—

    under your skin,

    in your chest—

    and stay there

    long after the flames die out.

    Now it’s not a blaze.

    It’s embers.

    A slow, aching glow

    that won’t go out,

    won’t let me forget

    what it felt like

    to be close enough

    to get burned.

    Because loving you

    wasn’t loud in the end.

    It didn’t explode.

    It just kept burning

    quietly—

    taking pieces of me

    with it

    until I realized

    I wasn’t warming up anymore.

    I was breaking down.

    And maybe

    that’s what he meant—

    not the kind of fire

    you stand near,

    but the kind

    you don’t notice

    is consuming you

    until there’s nothing left

    that doesn’t ache.